I am still not where I want to be, with respect to milestones, but I am feeling better about my progress for a few reasons. First, I had a very good meeting with my mentor which helped address some of my concerns about statistics. We agreed that I need to focus more on the concepts, and less on the underlying math that was the foundation of the ALEKS course. I am going to continue to focus on reading the Multivariate Data Analysis and reread Statistics Without Tears, then create a “cheat sheet”, with key terms and concepts. Second, I finally received all of my assignment evaluations and am pleased with my progress to date based on the actual grades and the detailed feedback.
Finally, I would be remiss to not highlight the benefit of taking a vacation day to get “back in gear”. I was finally able to create a Mind Map of my research ideas. This was an very efficient and meaningful tool to summarize my thinking and goals. It served as a very useful foundation for my conversation with my mentor. I downloaded the FREE software from http://freemind.sourceforge.net and found it fairly intuitive to use, with the exception of the ability to print. Sounds trivial but I had to play with font size to create something that was usable! I also input a few papers into my “research spreadsheet” and am developing the discipline to do so on an ongoing basis. Case in point the three papers that I read yesterday have already been input into the spreadsheet and my ENDNOTES.
The plan for the next week is aggressive, but thankfully both Thursday and Friday are scheduled as vacation days. I will dedicate a good portion of both days to statistics and take Saturday off to give myself a free day before beginning the Quantitative Methods workshop on Sunday. The workshop lasts for 6 fun-filled days, followed by an assignment. In many ways I am eager to begin because I know that the sooner I start, the sooner I am finished. Really looking forward to submitting the assignment and then enjoying some preparation for Christmas!